How to solve network data corruption with Realtek cards

published Jan 03, 2009, last modified Jun 26, 2013

Do you have a Realtek card driven by the r8169 driver, and you're experiencing SSH, SSL or rsync errors associated to the error message "Disconnected: Corrupted MAC on input"? Do you download large files only to find them corrupted? Here's the solution.

/usr/sbin/ethtool -K eth0 rx off

The card eventually fails to compute the correct receive checksums in the packets.  This turns the checksum offloading.  Put this command on your /etc/rc.local file if you want it to be applied every boot.

This works on at least Fedora 10, kernel 2.6.28.

Keywords
Fedora Realtek bugs Linux tips